kieser design interview

I have been into watches since my teenage years. I was really into Festina watches as the sponsored cycling. I enjoyed their quartz watches with all kinds of complications. Ever since then watches has stuck with me. Among others I was very much into Omega watches.

Later in life I studied business engineering and worked within finance. So, it was an office job. It took up a lot of my time, but it wasn’t really fulfilling. On my spare time I started to draw watches and make my own watch design. I discovered that I wanted to be a craftsman, work with my hands. While on parental leave, I got the idea that I could make a watch for myself. So, I kept on diving deeper into the art of watchmaking.

Slowly I accumulated watchmaking tools and gear and honed my skills as a watchmaker. I discovered that this could become a career and after a lengthy discussion and weighing the pros and cons me and my wife decided to start a business.

In 2019 we launched Kieser design, a watch brand based on true craftsmanship. After two years of hard work, we had our first prototype ready and later the first watch was launched. The Tragwerk T.

I wanted to make a lightweight watch and something different. Something colorful. I thought about making the cases colorful. However, adding color to a case, even if you use DLC coating it can scratch and ruin the look of the watch. Therefore, we decided to use titanium. Anodized titanium handled the right way has the capability to make beautiful colors. When you get it right, it is truly mesmerizing.

Aside from the sapphire crystal, the gaskets, and movement. The case, the dial, pin-buckle, strap and everything else is manufactured and hand finished at our workshop. The base movement is a top grade custom finished Sellita 200-1.The movement itself is finished with snailing, perlage, brushing and coated with rhodenium.

When creating a watch, we start out with a block of raw titanium. By using out CNC machines we work on that block to create the case, dial, hands, indices and everything. We then print our own dials and hand finish all the watch components.

We also have a custom rotor, made of titanium and 18 karat gold. I wanted the watch to stay lightweight and the rotor to be unique. We also wanted to show off the movement. Therefore, we skeletonized the rotor, made parts of the rotor out of anodized titanium, keeping it lightweight and allowing us to show off the top grade and custom finished Sellita movement.

The rotor is also designed to mimic the wings of a dragonfly. Creating this rotor took a lot of work. I wanted to keep the torque of a regular rotor, but have the rotor stay lightweight. By adding an 18k weight I was able to create the dragonfly inspired rotor you see here.

The strap is also created at our workshop and is handmade. This gives us the ability to create custom straps that fit the watch perfectly.

Amazing. This is a beautiful watch, and the movement has a great finish. A movement truly worth showing off. How come a dragonfly became an inspiration for the watch design?

As I mentioned earlier, I wanted to create something unique, inspired by nature, something colorful, capable of handling anything. After a lot of research, I decided to try to emulate the exoskeleton of a dragonfly. A solid outer shell protecting the soft and vulnerable organs, in this case the movement of the watch.

Therefore, the case is made up of an outer skeletonized case in brushed grade 5 titanium, surrounding an inner case of anodized, colorful titanium.

The dial is also titanium, available in a plain brushed titanium hue or more colorful variants such as a purple. We have a honeycomb finished dial that is designed to emulate the compound eyes of the dragonfly. But if you want a more low-key option the dial is also available in a plain straight brushed titanium.

We also wanted the watch to be sturdy and capable of withstanding everyday use. Therefore, it is 100m water resistant as well. Lastly as you see through this open case back there is a small piece of text on the edge of the case. This can be customized for every customer, for a unique touch. The same goes for the colors on the inner case, dial, stitching on the strap, hands and indices. Allowing the customer to create something truly unique is an important part of the brand.

Thank you. I was so lucky as to borrow a Tragwerk T prototype from Pylsogram with a purple honeycomb dial. It was a joy to handle.

Let me ask you, are all the watches made by you alone? Or do you have a team?

We have a small team of people that create the watches and we have hired our own videographer. A lot of watch enthusiast and customers want to see the steps of our watchmaking techniques and learn more about watchmaking. So, we created a Youtube channel, Kieser Design to share this process.

I will make sure to check out that Youtube channel then. What about the future for Kieser design? Anything in the pipeline? New watches and designs?

Yes, we have a lot of big ideas. This will take some time, but we have some announcements coming up in the future.

Great! Thank you so much for your time. I very much look forward to seeing what the future of Kieser Design looks like and see what you will announce in the future.